How many wolves are there in Singapore sheep?

The shocking news in the Straits Times Online "Self-Radicalised Singaporean Held" raises questions about how many other SAF soldiers full-time NSFs or regulars may be acting against the interests of the State while serving their full-time national service?

Conscription sweeps all able-bodied male citizens into bearing arms for the country if they serve the Singapore Armed Forces or the Singapore Police Force. Whether all who serve are willing volunteers to bear arms varies. Many of us if given a choice would not want to fulfil our national service as a soldier. I for one would have preferred to serve the country in other capacities i.e. as a volunteer in volunteer welfare organisation. Unfortunately, conscription doesn't allow us to choose. We are pressed into service.

Even as the system takes in each of us as a cog in the wheel that turns the SAF, SPF or SCDF, not all the cogs do it willingly. We do it because of the penalties. If you do not serve and go AWOL, you can be charged and sentenced to serve time in SAF Detention Barracks. Your NS record will be darker than any shade of black you can find in a colour scheme. You risk being ostracised by fellow male citizens who serve and even female citizens who do not. Some of us do serve in genuine heed to duty, honour and country but most of us just do it and f*** off is the attitude.

This case raises the question of how many other cases that are not detected? I would say that one of the real risks that could strike Singapore would be an insider, i.e. a disgruntled male citizen who has gone through NS in combat vocation go berserk during reservist when he has access to weapons and ammunition and even explosives. If a NSF or NSman went postal in an SAF camp, the damage within would be more frightening that what a potential terrorist from outside could inflict.

Is the SAF really aware of what is going on in their camps? How do they mind-read what the NSmen and NSF are truly thinking of? Servitude to the State can breed resentment especially given that NSmen and NSF take on big personal risks in their conscripted service but receive little in way of economic benefits vis-a-vis female citizens and first generation PR male citizens who do not have to serve any form of national service.

The SAF's reassurance in the article "Systems to Check Threats" doesn't sound very convincing. It appears that it is ISD that detected this case and not MSD or the unit itself. We don't know as there is scant information so far about this case. As the soldier involved has been detained under the Internal Security Act, there wouldn't be an open court for the public to know the full facts of the case and we would have to rely on the State to reveal the facts of the case.

How sure are we about the loyalty of conscripts? Perhaps it is timely to review if a fully-volunteer system replace conscription that feeds the Army's insatiable appetite for the two plus ten years of annual ICT from male citizens.

Majullah Singapura.